THE EYES OF PLANTS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 113, 28 September 1912, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE EYES OF PLANTS.

KEMARKABLE DISCOVERIES. "Condemned on the testimony of a scarlet geranium" may become one of the formulae of our law coudts (says the New York World). After long experience and study, Professor Gottlieb Halierlandt, of the Botanic Institute of Gratz, in Styria, 'declares that plants, the word taken in its widest sense and including trees, can see. The professor says that his observations have been confirmed by Dr. Xutta.ll, of London, and Dr. Harold Wagner, lie has succeeded through photography and the use of the microscope in reproducing the images reflected on the visual, organs of plants. The images included objects at different distances, and even persons and houses. Plants may, he says, be classed with the inferior animals in this respect. •He informs us that the epidermic cells of a plant are, in jact, just so many convex lens, as perfect as the facets of an insect's eye. In the common house lly there are over 4000 such facets, while the butterfly boasts of 17.000 eyes. Each left cellule of a plant is analogous to the facet of the fly's eye, which acts as another eye, says Professor Halierlandt, and in the same way reflects an infinite number of objects on the visual organ. A forest, spreading its myriad leaves to the sunshine, reflects in this way the sunbeams in its multitude of mirrors, each epidermic cell forming a separate lens. We are still so ignorant of animal plant and insect life (because we do not understand their language), that we fanny the plant, like the insect, is not conscious of what it sees, but that is probably a discovery for the future. At present we are forced to accept the theory that the}' are not conscious. But that they do see Professor Halierlandt says lie has satisfactorily proved. The eyes of plants appear different from the eyes of insects, in that they have no coloring matter, though it is not yet determined. The professor is continuing his experiments, and he expects to. make further interesting and surprising announcements. That plants and trees have eyes is undoubtedly a proof that all natural life is linked in one long chain. It suggests many strange thoughts. "What the pot plant saw" may become evidence in a court of law as convincing as a gramophone record. So the burglar, murderer, or other wrong-doer in the future will find it necessary not only to wear gloves, to destroy kodaks and vocal recording instruments, but to remove all plants befor committing a crime.